New Mexico Team Moves in on Glaucoma Staging System

Researchers discover a way to estimate vision-related quality of life, which tends to correlate with disease severity.

RO Staff

“While classification of glaucoma severity is critical for clinical management, there is no single staging system that has been universally adopted for our clinical use,” Tran Bianconi, OD, noted in a presentation yesterday at the Academy 2018 meeting in San Antonio. This is where her team stepped in.

They conducted a study to explore the viability of creating a glaucoma staging system using vision-related quality of life scores, and found that bilateral 24-2 visual field index scores correspond well with the stage of glaucoma a patient is experiencing.

The study evaluated 206 eyes of 103 primary open-angle glaucoma patients. The researchers administered NEI-VFQ-25 questionnaires to measure patient quality of life, and participants completed 24-2 and 10-2 visual field testing within six months of completing the questionnaire. The team then compared visual field summary metrics (mean deviation and pattern standard deviation for 24-2 and 10-2, and visual field index for 24-2) across the vision-related quality of life (VR-QOL)-based stages to investigate the utility of these variables in distinguishing between stages.

The researchers assessed field loss in the group as follows: 28% unaffected, 24% mild field loss, 18% moderate loss and 30% severe loss. When visual field metrics were compared with quality of life stage, the team found that 24-2 visual field index value was the only parameter significantly different between stages. Lower, intermediate and higher vision-related quality of life scores were associated with these respective mean visual field index scores: <85%, 85% to 94% and >94%.

The study concludes that average index scores may estimate patient-specific vision-related quality of life, which has been shown to correlate with glaucoma severity and could be used to develop a universal glaucoma staging system.